Glory
by a quarter tone apart
Summary: [A set of eyes had pinned him and became his version of a kingdom/She's everything the devil can't be] Bonnie and Kai; post 6x21 AU and beyond.
1. Chapter 1

**GLORY**

 **fandom:** the vampire diaries  
 **characters:** bonnie bennett, kai parker and tbh nobody else matters  
 **summary:** a set of eyes had pinned him and became his version of a kingdom/she's everything the devil can't be | Post 6x21 AU and beyond.  
 **a/n:** so I watched ONE video of kat graham & chris parker and now I'm all the way down this cesspit rabbit hole of wanting more for Bonnie Bennett. I won't use this as a platform to vent about my frustrations with TVD. Instead I'll just set the parameters for this AU: I've legit only watched like three full episodes of TVD; instead just watching all of Bonnie's scenes and became obsessed with Chris Wood's portrayal of Kai and all the (wasted) potential of his character. So apologies for any errors in how I portray Bonnie's magic or anything like that. Also, the prison worlds make zero sense to me. But I don't think Julie Plec was exactly the continuity queen of anything making sense so just slide right past any misconceptions I have.

* * *

Blurry-eyed and barely able to move; Kai awakes to streams of white light pouring over him. _Is this dying_? The drums kick in before a second thought can cross his mind.

The Spin Doctors. _I am dead_. Kai is suddenly aware that the weight on his chest isn't metaphorical. He jerks his arms uselessly beneath the chains.

"So this is Hell." His tone is matter-of-fact. The sun rises in the East. It sets in the West. And this is the afterlife.

 _Wait._

"When did I die?"

"I thought you'd never ask." The last voice he'd expect to hear in hell – and the first voice that he'd hope for – cuts his chain of thought short.

Bonnie steps out from behind a stage light. Her green eyes don't stray from his for a second. If she's cautious, she's doing well not to show it.

Kai tenses his shoulders and sits up a little straighter. "Bonnie," he says seriously. "Is this 1903? You came back?" He widens his eyes in mock hope; thinking about the last time he saw the Bennett witch in considerably colder conditions.

"Cut the act, Kai," she sneers. "The game's over for good this time."

He pauses, taking a moment to weigh his options. The facade is too cumbersome, he decides, and a wolfish grin slides across his face. He sinks back into his chair.

"So either I made it to heaven, or you really lost your way," Kai smirks. "What'd you do, Bonnie? Talk dirty to me."

Her nose wrinkles in disgust. Before Kai can comment on how cute that makes her look, Bonnie pulls out a chair and sits on it backwards. She comfortably folds her arms on the seat back.

"You should be thanking me," she says cryptically, cocking her head to one side. She's enjoying withholding the truth from him. It's like a build-up to a punchline. "For all you know, this is a lot better than what Hell really is."

"Oh, I'm sure of it," Kai banters. "Tuesday night karaoke, your beloved Mystic Grill. All you need is to unchain me and we could have ourselves a date night."

Bonnie rolls her eyes, propping her chin up on one hand. "You _would_ like that, wouldn't you? Too bad you being a mass murderer is a bit of a deal-breaker."

A not-so-familiar pang shudders through Kai's stomach. Ever since the merge with Luke, his body betrays him in times like this. A rush of adrenaline here, a hollow pit in his stomach there. It's exhausting, and he doesn't care for it. He swallows and attempts to disguise his discomfort. "All that time together. I thought we were past that."

"Playing dumb isn't becoming on you," Bonnie snaps. "I know about the deal you offered Lily." She pulls a remote off the table and pauses their incessant soundtrack. "Stefan got it out of her. That's your downfall, Kai. You don't get what it means to have a family."

Another pang. This one is harder to ignore. "Don't I? Lily's need to be reunited with her merry band of freaks was my ticket out. Of course I _get_ it."

Bonnie shakes her head at him. She stands up and walks toward him, pacing in a circle around his chair. "Everyone assumed you wanted her blood just to be stronger. But I worked it out," she muses; unable to hide the pride in her voice. "You were going to kill yourself and take out your entire family while you were at it." She pauses in front of him and locks her eyes with his. "You're a monster. I knew you always had been."

Heat rises through Kai's body; his blood boiling. He clenches his jaw. "Well, could you blame me?" The anger is unfamiliar. He's used to feeling cold, calculated and entirely in control. Now his words escape him like he has no say whatsoever. "After my family realised what I was, they treated me like an _animal_. I couldn't touch anyone. I couldn't sit at the dinner table. They locked me in my room when I slept."

Bonnie frowns. She's never seen him so defensive. "That's not an excuse for what you did," her tone rising. "Or for what you were going to do. Jo is _pregnant._ Your sister."

Kai scoffs derisively. "And what a family she'll raise. Pitting those two against each other like lambs for a slaughter. It's sick. It has to end."

Blinking her eyes, Bonnie takes a step backwards. Is that… _regret_ that she can surmise in Kai's tone? "No," she says adamantly, answering her own question. "You were doing this for revenge. There isn't a human bone in your body. You may have the others fooled with your post-merge act, but not me."

A laugh escapes him. "Oh, yes. The others. You and your friends are like a regular episode of Happy Days – except, oh wait! They're all blood-sucking monsters. Tell me, if I'm the mass murderer, how many lives have they clocked up between them?" Kai taunts her out of desperation. "How many times has it been your life?"

"You don't know what you're talki-"

"Don't I?" Kai cuts her off. "Don't I know exactly what I'm talking about? They use you, Bonnie. And here you are taking it all out on me." He squirms beneath his chains; knows that he's gambling now. "You need a monster to make up for all the things you've had to tolerate. And here I am."

"God, do you _ever_ stop talking?" Bonnie is exasperated, whirling around and walking to the back of the Grill. She retrieves a bottle of some identifiable liquor from behind the counter and helps herself to a swig.

"If I'm wrong, where is everyone?" Kai asks quietly. "For someone who loves the view from their high horse, your take on justice is questionable at best."

"There is no one else," Bonnie replies calmly. "Just you, and your insecure little mind, and a song you hate…on a jukebox…playing over and over again, forever. Just like this day." An Ascendant appears from her pocket, and she turns the object over in her hands.

It dawns on him. "So, it's just like you leaving me in 1903 all over again? Only this time without the shock factor." Kai chuckles. "Maybe I will see you in hell."

Bonnie frowns. "What's _that_ supposed to mean?"

"Creating a whole new prison world just to lock me and all your insecurities away? You'll never admit it, but I _know_ you Bonnie. And this isn't you."

A shudder goes down her spine at his words. "You don't know me," she finally says. With a click of the remote, the music is back on.

Kai blinks and struggles with his chains. "Bonnie?" He rocks back and forth as the panic descends. "No. Bonnie? BONNIE!"

A few hours later, when he's calmed down, he wonders if she heard him say her name.

And he wonders if that's the last thing anyone will ever hear him say.

* * *

No one asks her about Kai and her request to be left alone to deal with him. But, two weeks later when Jo and Alaric are safely on their honeymoon and Bonnie is still a reclusive shell of her once bubbly self, Caroline instigates drastic action.

"Come on, Bonnie. Come over for one drink. We miss you."

"Care, I'm really not in the mood. These past few weeks-"

"I know, I know. It's crazy. But that's why we have to keep close to each other. Look, Elena's here. It'll be just the three of us. I'll put you on speakerphone, one sec."

Before Bonnie can protest, she hears a familiar voice chime in with Caroline's pleadings. "Bonnie! We really want you here. We'll slumber it, like old times."

"We're not trying to get you hammered. No Tuesday night karaoke, I promise." Caroline laughs.

"What?" Bonnie nearly drops her phone as she jerks upward from her previously horizontal position in bed. "What did you say?"

"It's Tuesday night…what's the big deal? I said we won't go!" Caroline insists.

"Bonnie you just…you haven't been yourself lately. We're worried about you," Elena adds.

The thought of Kai Parker, chained to a chair, forced to live another round of Tuesday night karaoke cuts through Bonnie like a searing knife. His words echo in her head. _They use you, Bonnie_. She sucks in her breath. "Maybe I don't feel like myself because when I was stuck in another decade for six months, my friends baked cupcakes instead of trying to find me."

Bonnie misses her Motrola Razr flip phone. Jamming her thumb on the 'end' button of her touch screen phone is far less satisfying. Instead, she picks up a pillow, leans forward into her bent knees and screams with all her might. Tears of frustration and fury pool in her eyes. The Salvatore Boarding house, where her friends were happily cooped up with a brother apiece, wasn't her idea of a great girls night. There was nowhere left in Mystic Falls that didn't remind her of May 10, 1994. Getting rid of Kai hadn't ended anything. It didn't close a chapter of her life with a neat flourish.

 _Maybe he was right_. Maybe she had been taking out six years of frustration on Malachai Parker, the Wicked Witch of the Pacific Northwest. Shaking her head, Bonnie flings the pillow across her room. Kai doesn't know her. None of her friends know her.

After splashing some cold water on her face, an idea begins to form in her head. She hops up on a kitchen stool and pulls a suitcase down from her closet. It's coated in dust: a sign it itself that it was time to leave.

She's packed in under ten minutes.

* * *

Bonnie Bennett may be plenty of things but a prison mastermind is not one of them.

Kai relishes this though **t** as he breaks his chains (unfortunately, only literally) after three days of imprisonment. As a Siphoner, he'd been forced to learn other magic tricks and picking locks was one of them. His muscles are in agony. He rolls his shoulders back and forth and attempts to stand. His knees give way and he's back in his chair with a resounding thud.

He feels so mortal; it physically hurts.

He's trying to avoid the other part of him that hurts: the part that's not physical. Years of uncertainty, empathy, anxiety…years of any feeling other than apathy seem to be descending on him at once. There's only one feeling he's moderately interested in, however. Only one that doesn't feel like more a burden than the chains that, until recently, were keeping him tightly bound.

Forgiveness. It's his only way to freedom. Though, how he can get Bonnie Bennett to forgive him when she is a whole other world away is beyond him – for now.

Once he musters the will to stand, Kai practically runs to the doors of the Grill. It's never daylight in this new world of his, but he's always been more of a night owl anyway. In any case, nothing can diminish the first breath of outside air. The sound of silence fills him with elation, and he starts walking.

At the first driveway he sees, Kai whips off his jacket and bunches it around his fist. One shattered window later and he's inside his first home in Mystic Falls.

He's got plenty of time to kill. One of these suburban nightmares has to be the Bennett home.

* * *

A/N: thank you for reading! Two more parts coming. I'm hoping the premise makes sense – Kai is stopped in his tracks before the atrocities of 6x22 can happen, but then we skip ahead to the only relevant parts of the S8 finale for Bonnie (sending Kai to a prison world and then going to live her own life like the queen she is). Feel free to leave any feedback on ambiguities in the comments.

[Edited 10/04 for consistency and proofreading]


	2. Chapter 2

Unlike Caroline, Bonnie lacks a flair for the dramatic. She's made a few quiet exits in the past few years: departing Mystic Falls to mourn Grams; hiding her death from her friends. It's a routine she hates herself for feeling accustomed to.

There's something not right about spending months in a prison world only to realise that more than anything, she needs to be alone. As Bonnie rolls up a pair of denim jeans and assesses which boots to pack, two things dawn on her:

1\. With a simple extension charm, she can bring all three pairs.

2\. It's not that she needs to be alone. No, she needs distance from this town and the people in it.

There is an unfamiliar feeling brimming within her; threatening to spill over and do even more damage to her battered relationships. It surfaced on the phone with Caroline and Elena. It surfaces whenever she grazes a hand over the scar tissue on her stomach. And she's not sure whether the solution is to push it down deep, deep within herself or let it cascade and destroy everything in its course.

Less like a waterfall, more like an avalanche.

 _They use you, Bonnie_.

His voice echoes in her head – always unwelcome, always impeccably timed. She slams her suitcase shut. "I am _not_ like you," she spits. The lightbulb in her bedroom flickers and spits sparks. Bonnie is left standing in the dark.

With an exasperated sigh, she flicks her hand and fixes the damage. Tempting as it is to leave without a second thought, she picks up her phone and sends a message to the group chat with Caroline and Elena:

 _I'm sorry. You didn't deserve that. I'm heading out of town. Talk soon._

After using her phone to call a cab to the airport, Bonnie stashes it in her bedside drawer. She's pretty sure she won't get reception in Amsterdam.

* * *

Bonnie Bennett's gleaming white teeth are the first thing to catch Kai's eye when he (finally) steps inside Sheila Bennett's home. It's a framed photo; innocuous enough in its position next to other Bennett family members. She's a teenager; caught mid-laugh and posing in her cheerleading uniform. The pom-poms aren't what stops Kai in the doorway.

No, it's the lurch in his stomach that does it. He's never seen the Bonnie he knows smile like that – definitely not at him, but not at anyone else for that matter. No, the image burnt into his brain is of Bonnie gasping for life amidst a cloud of carbon monoxide in the 1994 prison world.

He shudders at the thought of it. Life post merge is complicated. It has him contemplating consequences of actions he never thought twice about. It has him contemplating what life would be like if Bonnie Bennett were to ever flash a smile that bright in his direction.

Kai steps forward and turns the picture frame around. For all he knows, he's got decades left to contemplate these things. He doesn't feel like starting now.

* * *

"Can you take a picture?"

Bonnie blinks back into focus to see a phone dangling in her face. Its owner, a youthful girl with freckles, flashes a smile of encouragement.

"Of course," Bonnie replies, self-consciously tucking a strand of hair behind her ear as she accepts the phone. She waits politely as the girl and her friends assort themselves across the iconic letters of the I Amsterdam sign. As she snaps the photos, she wonders how long she's been standing there for. So far, her epic escape has been solitary – worse still, with plenty of time to contemplate the events of the past few months.

Leaving Mystic Falls was supposed to make the nightmares stop. Her premonitions of being hunted by Lily and siphoned by Kai had proven true when Stefan confronted his mother about her conspiring with everyone's least favourite Parker sibling.

A locator spell later, Kai could prove himself no match for the full force of the Mystic Falls scooby gang. After Damon secured Bonnie's enchanted restraints on him, he raised his hand back to deliver the final blow. The one that was supposed to end it all.

And then, as always, Kai had to go and open his damn mouth.

"Death is just the next greatest adventure." He glanced up with a devilish smile, locking his eyes with Bonnie.

Bonnie's eyebrows shot up despite herself. "Did you just-"

"I had a bit of catching up to do, and Harry Potter seemed like a good place to start. Although, the kid is an idiot. 'Not Slytherin'?"

Damon had been appalled by this exchange. "You about done, Bon?"

Whatever Kai's intention had been, his words had an impact on Bonnie. She held her hand up to Damon, silencing him. "No," she murmured, taking a step closer to Kai. "Death is too good for him."

"Are you going to torture me, Bonnie?" Kai teased in response. He winked. "That's kind of hot."

Doing her best to ignore him, Bonnie turned to face Damon. "24 hours. Keep him under lock and key for 24 hours and I'll give him the afterlife he deserves."

It had only taken her six to crack the code to creating another prison world, plus another twenty minutes to design the set-up. Bonnie had been on auto-pilot the whole time, consumed with the new project that beckoned. There was no time to consider good or bad; no time to consider forgiveness or punishment.

Until the night she introduced Kai to his new eternal home. That night, Kai Parker appeared in her nightmares again: same crude smile, same semi-shaven face.

"It's your world, Bonnie. I'm just living in it. And you're living with the guilt of putting me here."

She'd woken up in a cold sweat; desperately tearing through the Salvatore mansion. Any time Kai Parker was near, she felt it before she saw him. That _feeling_. That crawling under her skin that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up and sent shudders of adrenaline down her spine.

Even now, thousands of miles away as she takes pictures of three giggling girls in Amsterdam, Bonnie can still feel it.

Bonnie hands the camera back to the tourist and picks up her bag. _Fuck this_. She marches off in search of the nearest coffeeshop.

* * *

Kai tells himself his intentions for seeking refuge in the Bennett household are purely educational. Maybe with the aid of a Bennett grimoire, he can find himself a loophole. A glitch in the system that is this new eternity of solitude he's found himself in.

Within minutes, he has a stack of photo albums on the kitchen table and he's helped himself to the only junk food he could find in the (in his opinion) utterly under-resourced pantry: rice crackers. Hardly satisfying, but he's not really paying attention to what he's eating.

The first couple albums of family photos are predictable: baby Bonnie Bennett, with gleaming green eyes and surrounded by adoring family members. Kai scoffs and flips rapidly though the pages. His dismissal doesn't prevent the pang of envy that shoots through his stomach.

His eyes land on a photo of a young Bonnie, Elena and Caroline flashing cheesy grins on their first day of school. "Some friends you got yourself stuck with," he mutters. Kai isn't altogether too familiar with the concept of friendship, but he's heard enough bickering between Bonnie and Damon to question its usefulness.

He pushes the photo albums away sullenly, as though suddenly sickened by their concepts. He entertains the idea in his mind of being an only child, as Bonnie Bennett is. Would his parents fill encyclopaedic photo albums of his pictures? Would they listen when he spoke, and notice when he didn't? The thoughts build in his mind until an unfamiliar stinging sensation pricks the back of his eyes.

 _Not this again_.

To distract himself, Kai flicks his wrist in the direction of the pantry. " _Motus_ ," he snaps without bothering to disguise the desperation in his voice. Nothing. And no scheming child-murderer to incentivise him to get his magic back, either. Thoroughly frustrated by this point, Kai abandons the kitchen and paces the corridors of the Bennett house.

He lingers outside the same bedroom door, again. Kai is beginning to immensely dislike this new version of himself that seems to have two answers to every question. One is familiar. The second almost always _complicates_ things. _Don't go through Bonnie Bennett's bedroom._ Or, mere weeks ago, _don't drink the Heretic blood._

Be good, the voice may as well be telling him.

But that just reminds him of his father's cold voice, scolding him for something or the other. Chastising him for never being like Josette.

Besides, little miss not-so-innocent Bonnie Bennett is the reason he's trapped in this purgatory. Being bad is relative, he decides.

So he pushes open the door.

* * *

Haziness agrees with her, Bonnie decides as she climbs into bed after struggling to ascend the latter to her top bunk. After carefully limiting herself to half of a space cake at the first coffee shop she encountered, she ended up finding some smoking buddies at her hostel. The sun disappeared into the horizon, and Bonnie found herself sitting there for hours – for the first time, feeling somewhat at peace as they giggled over card games and annoyed the guy at the reception request with song requests.

"So what about you, Bonnie?" A French girl who had just regaled everyone with a tale of a whirlwind relationship that quickly went sour took a puff of her joint and passed it to Bonnie. "I am running from my crazy ex-girlfriend, Yukiko is running from being a lawyer. What are you running from?"

Bonnie accepted the joint and rolled the question around in her mind. _What am I running from?_ "Monsters," she responded adamantly. She smiled curtly as the group erupted in laughter.

When she's lying in bed, it's the first night in a while that she's not thinking of monsters – vampires, werewolves and hybrids, oh my. She's not even thinking of one particular monster; the one with a face of an angel that has been plaguing her for weeks.

Her mind is blank as a slate – and it feels glorious.

She wakes, and it's still dark outside. Fumbling around for her flashlight, Bonnie instead finds the switch for the lamp on her nightstand. A pale gold glow illuminates the familiar surroundings of her bedroom. She rolls onto her side to check her watch and freezes at the sight of her bookshelf.

Kai Parker is jauntily sitting atop it.

Bonnie's scream is partially muffled by her pillow. She sits straight up in her bed, her expression aghast.

"No need to rush, Bonnie. Why don't I read you a bedtime story? I knew you were a Harry Potter fan." Kai gestures to the contents of Bonnie's beloved childhood bookshelf.

She frantically mutters a spell in response; and has no luck. Kai frowns, deeply offended. "You're always too quick to act. Didn't you design this place to be magic free?"

Bonnie furiously pushes back her covers and stalks to the opposite end of her room, pulling a Mystic Falls Timberwolves hoodie over her thin t-shirt. "Why can't I get _rid_ of you?" she groans, almost tempted to stamp her foot in frustration.

Kai smiles like she's asked him the exact right question. "Obviously because you don't want to," he replies smoothly, hopping down from the bookshelf. "You and me. We're not done yet."

She eyes him cautiously and rubs her eyes with her sweatshirt sleeves. "It's never an eye-for-an-eye for you is it? So much for turning over a new leaf."

Kai moves towards her, and in response she steps back until she is pressing against her bedroom wall. "If we're keeping score," he reasons, "I've only got one on you. You stabbed me twice and now you've deserted me twice." He loiters a few feet from where Bonnie is paused. "Doesn't that seem like excessive force on your part?"

"How about we tally up lives? You were going to take out your entire coven!" Bonnie snaps.

"And since when are they innocent in any of this?" Kai closes the distance between them, his voice suddenly void of all charm. "You want to defend your twisted army of friends, go for it. But don't go making excuses for mine," he says darkly.

Bonnie swallows, craning her neck upwards so she can look him in the face. She hates how tall he his. Hates the hatred that courses through her veins, sending her heart beating wildly and leaving her fists clenched.

"What about Jo?" Bonnie speaks through gritted teeth. "How does she deserve to die?"

Kai pauses, his expression softening as he thinks about his twin sister. "I was going to feed her Lily's blood," he admits quietly. "Liv, too. It might not be the life they'd choose, but at least we'd be free of the Gemini tradition for good."

"You're lying."

"You're so certain?" Kai snaps incredulously, cocking his head to one side. He pushes back the sleeve of his jacket and extends his wrist to Bonnie. "Feel my heartbeat. Go on. You may not have magic, but you still have the magic of science."

Bonnie glances at the exposed skin of his wrist, then shifts her gaze back to Kai's face warily.

"Fine," he concedes. "You wouldn't believe me anyway. You're quick to judge, Bonnie. Which is ironic considering the company you keep." Kai slinks away from Bonnie towards a photo on her nightstand: Bonnie and Elena, arms wrapped tightly around one another. "At least you're consistent. Unlike this one, who seems to reserve her judgement for whichever bloodsucker she doesn't have a boner for."

Bonnie cuts her eyes at him, stalking towards him and swiping the photo out of his reach. "Lay off my friends," she warns.

"Oh trust me, I was going to," Kai looks at her curiously. "I had no reason to stay in Mystic Falls after transitioning. But I wasn't going to leave you without a parting gift." Mere inches exist between him and Bonnie now. "I discovered a nifty little trick in Luke's grimoire. A spell to link Elena's life to yours. She'd be comatose until you took your last breath as a human."

Bonnie's eyebrows knit together as she attempts to process what Kai is saying. Somehow, it begins raining from the ceiling. Water courses down, drenching them both as they gaze at each other. Bonnie shivers, hugging her arms around herself. "Why would you do that?"

A beat passes before Kai gently places his hands on her shoulders. "Because you deserve more, Bonnie."

* * *

Bonnie is startled awake by a piercing siren and the feeling of water pouring down on her. Through blurred vision, she can just make out the orange flicker of flames in the empty hostel bed opposite her.

 _Did I do that?_

"Bonnie!" Yukiko's voice breaks her stupor. "Bonnie, run!"

 _I'm trying_ , Bonnie thinks to herself. She mutters under her breath and the flames are quelled. Slipping down from her bunk, she looks around the room to assess the damage. "Is anyone hurt?" she asks Yukiko.

"I don't think so. Come on, we need to evacuate."

 _If only I could_ , Bonnie thinks, still able to feel the weight of Kai Parker's hands.

* * *

 **a/n** : BONKAI FAMILY! The love is real. Thank you so much to everyone who is reading and writing fanfic, sharing art and thoughts and edits and just keeping this community alive. Special thank-you to reviewers who have left kind and thoughtful comments - it's super motivating when it's v hard to prioritise writing amidst other 'life' priorities. Nonetheless, I hope I have somewhat delivered on the request for more Kai and Bonnie scenes despite them literally being worlds apart.

I actually had more planned for this chapter but it was just getting too long-winded. So maybe it'll be a four part story? Maybe not. We'll see!

Any constructive criticism on writing style/use of TVD universe is warmly welcomed :)


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